Chapter 6

Bill called me Sunday night. At first, he pretended that he had called just to talk to me, but then he kept asking me questions about Kate until I finally asked him if he wanted to speak with her. He told me that he wouldn't mind just saying hello to her. I called Kate to the phone and she and Bill talked for the next hour. I was in the living room when Kate came to get me to tell me that Bill wanted to talk to me before he hung up. I went back to the phone.

"What did you and my cousin do at the park?"

"We talked. How come you asked me to come meet you there and then didn't even show up?"

"Eileen asked me to, that's why. You should thank me for doing you a favor."

"I hope you aren't expecting me to do you that same favor with Kate."

"I know you wouldn't do it. Who do you think would win in a fight between Tommy and me?"

"How should I know? He's a little bigger, but you probably are stronger and tougher. I don't think it would be easy for you, but, you'd probably take him. What do you have against Tommy?"

"Eileen told me that he's been talking about Kate."

"Talking about her, how?"

"Eileen says that Tommy says he felt Kate up at your party."

"Did you ask Kate about that?"

"No, and don't you tell her about what Tommy has been saying either. She'd just get upset."

"She told me about it already. Said she kicked him as soon as he tried anything. I don't think it came to much. I didn't know he was going around telling stories about it though."

"I'm going to talk with him about it tomorrow. If he says that stuff to me, I'm going to kick his ass."

I didn't know what to say to him. If it was my girlfriend, I'd make him stop saying things too. Tommy was a big guy and already had hair on his chest. He was almost a full grown man already, at fourteen. He had grown a little mustache when he was in sixth grade, but the school made him shave it off. His sister, Mary, was in the seventh grade with Kate. She looked like she was growing a mustache too. I liked Tommy all right, but he was a liar and a thief, and none too bright either. I didn't like him talking about my sister either, but if I said anything to him about it, it would probably make it worse. He would probably kick my ass too.

The next morning, right after first period, Tommy and Bill got in a fight in the school hallway, right in front of the auditorium. I didn't see the fight, but when it got broken up by some teachers, Tommy's nose was bleeding, and Bill had a split lip. I was in the cafeteria eating, when I noticed Tommy and several of his friends, talking and horsing around. I heard Tommy speak Kate's name. For some reason, it really pissed me off. Before, it had just been other people saying that he was talking about my sister. Now, I'd heard it coming from his own lips. I got up and ran over to him and pushed him in his chest.

"If I ever hear that you said another thing about my sister, Tommy, I'm going to kick your ass." He grabbed me, and was wrestling me to the floor. I tried to punch him in the face, but I missed. When we landed on the floor though, my elbow got jammed right in his eye. It was really an accident, since he landed right on top of me. It must have really been painful for him because he grabbed at his face with both of his hands and rolled off of me. I got up, not really knowing what had happened. I noticed that he was crying then. I took advantage of the situation. "You better never talk about my sister again, asshole! If you do, I'll come back, and next time, I won't let you off so easy." I went back over to my table and got my unfinished sandwich and bag, and walked outside into the food courtyard where the vending machines were. I was shaking from the adrenaline that had coursed through my body as soon as Tommy grabbed at me.

Not five minutes later, Tommy came barreling through the door from the cafeteria to the courtyard. There were about fifteen people following after him. I thought he was coming out to finish the fight he and I had been having, but then I saw Dan Clarence reaching out and punching Tommy in the mouth. Dan was a senior, and was a lineman on the football team. His sister, Laura Clarence, was Tommy's girlfriend. Tommy kept backing up and Dan kept after him until Tommy just turned around and started running away. Three fights in one half of a school day. That was probably a record or something. Tommy went home after running away, I guess, because I didn't see him in gym class or in History class either later that day. It was all over school that Tommy had said something bad about Dan's sister too.

After school, I was walking home when Bill caught up with me.

"Tell me what really happened in the cafeteria today. People said you hit Tommy so hard that he gave up and started crying. I know that can't be true. What really happened?"

"Toonderbolt, Bill, that's what happened. He never had a chance. After that, when I got him all softened up, Dan Clarence managed to make him run away. He was chasing him out in the courtyard after punching him, and Tommy just ran away. Three times he got his ass kicked today." I was being generous, since reports on Bill's fight had said that it was a draw.

"One punch? That's all?"

"No, that's not all. First, I pushed him to let him know I was there to kick his ass. When he charged at me, I dropped him. He landed on me so hard that his weight made me fall down too. I got up and was going to really kick his ass, but he wouldn't get up, and then he started crying."

"I wish I had been there to see it, Larry. He's strong though. I can't believe you did it with only one punch. I hit him eight or nine times, but he just kept after me."

"Well, between the three of us, I'm sure he's learned his lesson. If he hasn't, I'm going to keep kicking his ass until he does."

Tommy came back to school the next morning, and was promptly called into the vice principal's office. He was told he would be expelled from school permanently, if he got in one more fight on school grounds the rest of the year. I had a class with him for second period, and he had a huge black shiner under his right eye, the one I poked with my elbow when he landed on top of me. I glared over at him with as menacing of an expression as I could manage. Neither one of us said anything though. The whole school was talking about Tommy. As the stories were told and retold, the beatings he had suffered got more and more violent. When I heard some of them at the end of the day, they had grown to the point where you had to wonder how Tommy had survived three such horrific beatings. I did nothing to correct any of the assumptions people might arrived at over my part in it.

Somehow, Kate found out about all of this. I certainly didn't say anything to her about any of it. I think it was Thursday, right after I got home from school that she came into my bedroom, and started asking me questions about all of it. What I told her was pretty much the whole truth, as far as I knew it. I told her that I had heard Tommy talking about her and had pushed him. I told her that, in the struggle afterwards, I got in a good shot right on his eye. When I told her that I hadn't seen Tommy and Bill going at it, she was disappointed. I did tell her that Bill had heard that Tommy was saying things about her, and that was what started the first fight. She seemed disappointed when I told her that the third fight wasn't about her at all.

"Thank you for sticking up for me, Larry. I hope that you and Bill didn't get in too much trouble for fighting?"

"No, it was Tommy that got into trouble. The rest of us didn't get punished at all. Bill got yelled at by a couple of teachers, and they made him and Tommy shake hands, then, that was it. No one said anything to me about it."

"Are you and Bill planning on doing anything together this weekend?"

"No, I don't think so. Maybe we'll go to the park or something, but we don't have any real plans."

"I'd like to see him, so I could say thank you to him too."

"Call him. He's probably home by now."

"I'm not going to call him. Girls aren't supposed to call boys anyway. I thought you were going to help Bill and I see each other?"

"Not every day. Just when we're doing something where we might want to have girls hanging around with us. You know, like if we're going to the movies at night."

"Friday night Elmer Gantry is playing at the movies."

"I saw it last month."

"Saturday night is The Apartment, have you seen that one?"

"No, what's it about?"

"I don't know. It's supposed to be a good one though."

"How about if I call Bill, and then ask him to talk to you while I go do something?"

"Sure, it's okay as long as you are the one that calls him."

I called Bill, and then we got talking about school and other things, so I forgot all about Kate waiting to talk to him too, I forgot right up until she poked me one in the ribs with her elbow to remind me.

"Bill I've got to go write something down before I forget it, talk to Kate until I get back, okay?" I handed Kate the phone and went into my bedroom. I shut the door to make sure I wouldn't have to listen to her end of the conversation. When I came back out a half an hour later, she was still talking to him. When I walked past her, I told her that she better hope that mom and dad weren't trying to get through on the telephone.

"Bill, Larry's finally finished with whatever he was doing, I'll talk to you later, okay?" She handed me the phone and went into her room.

"Gee, Bill, what the heck do you two talk about for so long?"

"We were talking about a lot of things. She says that it's all over her school about us beating up Tommy Lampkin. She was telling me about what movies are playing this weekend. I wouldn't mind seeing a movie this weekend. You want me to see if Eileen wants to go too?"

"I don't want to go see a movie. Isn't there anything better to do?"

"Well, I'd like to see a movie, and so would Kate."

"Bill, you can go see all the movies you want to, just not with Kate. It makes no difference to me. I already saw Elmer Gantry, and that other one on Saturday doesn't sound that hot to me. Why can't you come up with something different for us to do?"

"Don't both your parents work on Saturday?"